Photo by Daiga Ellaby on Unsplash

Come to think of it, it has been about over six months since I last updated the blog. Undoubtedly, many things have happened in between this period of time. Firstly, it has been a year since I have first started working as a junior doctor in Malaysia. Having said that, I have completed the first year of internship and I am currently doing my fourth rotation in Obstetrics and Gynecology department as a second year intern.

Well, the thought of life getting easier as you advanced through career is not as pretty as it sounds. Having completed internal medicine, orthopedic and pediatric rotations previously certainly did not prepare me well enough to enter the O&G world as it is a field of its own. The reason being the main focus of O&G is on the female reproductive system which none of the previous mentioned departments have to deal with.

Also, it is worth to note that working in the O&G department is comparably more stressful than other departments as the doctors are dealing with two lives at the same time. Whenever patients collapsed in the ward ( pretty uncommon), we have to attend the patient immediately without wasting any time as each second is important to ensure survival of both the pregnant mom and the child that she is bearing.

Aside from that, some of the hospitals here have been converted to covid-19 centers in order to take in all the covid patients and prevent them from spreading to other patients in the hospitals that are not suffering form covid-19. That includes the hospital that I am working. Junior doctors in certain departments are fortunate as the workload in their departments have been reduced to minimal due to the pandemic especially the surgical based departments. Most of the elective operations have either been delayed or canceled.

Nonetheless, that is not the case with Obstetrics department. No pandemic or natural disasters could stop a pregnant mother from signs and symptoms of labour after all. The admissions are packed as usual and there were numerous patients like any other day. While some of the preggies came in for labour, there were pregnant moms who came in with bleeding.

Albeit most of them are not in serious condition and they were able to deliver their babies safely soon after, unfortunately there were a small amount of them who suffered miscarriages. The saddest part of this event that I have ever witnessed was a pregnant lady who was 39 weeks pregnant and she insisted to deliver her baby on 40 weeks as it was her wedding anniversary despite the advice to deliver earlier as she has gestational diabetes.

When the time came, we found out that her baby's heart has stopped and the baby has passed away. It was such a sad scene and all of us were taken aback by the incident. It was however, the saddest news for both of the couple and they were sobbing non-stop.

Otherwise, most of the pregnant women were able to deliver their babies healthily be they normal vaginal delivery or through cesarean section. Shortly after few days, both the moms and their babies are discharged from the hospital. As I have only started working recently in this department, I foresee myself facing with lots of challenges when taking care of these pregnant moms and in no doubt I will learn a whole lot new knowledge throughout these four months in the department. Wish me luck. xx